New Vic Theatre They Don’t Pay? We Won’t Pay!

The play started with a good old sing song lead by all of the cast members, armed with a guitar and a mouth organ, with audience participation, so my mood had brightened considerably as I sang along even before the play started!

‘They Don’t Pay? We won’t pay!’ is the best play I have seen in a long time as I laughed all the way through it! That is not to say that there weren’t some very serious and thought-provoking messages! And a good helping of contemporary political digs!

The play highlights the outrageous truth that there are still a lot of people today who are struggling to pay for the basic necessities in life – with references to unpaid rent and the choice between heating and eating!

Just a quick summary – a riot breaks out in the local Aldi and ‘Anthea’ is one of the crowd who hot-foot it out of the store with free groceries. Events from there centre around hiding the spoils from moralistic husbands and the Police.

Excuses, explanations, justifications and reasons get crazier, sillier and funnier, and there are some absolute ‘laugh out loud’ one liners, all delivered flawlessly.

There is a great rapport between the cast members, and the audience are included in the ‘in-jokes’ – the fact that Michael Hugo plays five different characters is actually referred to in the play.

A great performance by all involved culminating in a well deserved standing ovation from the Tuesday night crowd at the New Vic.

I highly recommend this play, in fact, I am going to see it again before the end of the week!